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Saturday, October 15, 2011

Fort Sumter - another day, another fort

Oct. 5
Note to others considering a trip like ours: if you have girls, particularly girls who are not particularly into the warlike portion of our nation’s history, you probably don’t need to visit more than one fort. If you’ve seen one, visited with its docents, checked out the guns and considered the strategic placement of a fort, that should do you.

Then again, there’s Fort Sumter. Though we’ve visited a few forts in our travels, I found the placement of this fort, on an island in the mouth of a bay, particularly interesting. What about tides? Floods? Hurricanes? And how on earth could this little island really defend all this space? Turns out those old guns can shoot a lot further than I’d ever imagined. Forts north and south of Fort Sumter gave added coverage. No pirates or rebels were likely to make it through the combined barrage of artillery here.

The related story of the Union troops’ taking of this fort, their survival here, and the final Revolutionary War battles here was interesting, too.

The girls, however, were unenthusiastic at best. V was entertained by the heavy wind. E enjoyed watching the dolphins play with the bow wave on the ferry.